Department of Economics, Damghan University, Damghan, Iran.
چکیده
This study investigates the asymmetric influence of economic development on the financial structure of Iran through the framework of New Structural Financial Economics (NSFE). Using the nonlinear autoregressive distributed lag (NARDL) model and data for 1991–2023, economic development is measured by real GDP per capita and decomposed into positive and negative variations to capture short-run and long-run dynamics. The findings reveal indicator-specific and horizon-dependent asymmetries. When financial structure is measured by the relative size of capital markets to the banking sector (FSS), strong long-run asymmetry is observed: negative income shocks exert substantially larger adverse effects than positive shocks, underscoring the vulnerability of market size to downturns. Conversely, when financial structure is measured by market activity (FSA), the asymmetry emerges in the short run: positive shocks stimulate trading and participation, while negative shocks trigger disproportionately larger declines in activity, reflecting the volatility of equity markets. Control variables such as inflation, industrial value added, and trade openness, as well as dummy variables derived from Bai–Perron structural break tests further enrich the analysis. Overall, the results highlight that financial structure in Iran is highly sensitive to contractions in economic development, but the timing and channel of asymmetry differ across measures. This evidence underscores the fragility of market development and suggests that sustainable financial deepening requires policies that stabilize equity markets and reduce the dominance of banks, particularly during adverse economic conditions.